Ram Frequency Overclock

[radyab1297]

Hi all,

I have kingstone hyperx fury 2*8GB DDR4 2133MHz cl14 ram on my system. I overclocked it to 2400MHz in the bios and it is stable. I want to know that what is the difference between buying higher clock ram and overclocking it. For example if I have the same model with 2400MHz speed out of the box, does it have any difference between my overclocked ram?
My system is:
Core i7 6700K
GTX 1080
playing at 1440p@60Hz
I want to have the best performance for this system, so I dont want ram to be a problem.

If there is sensible difference in performance, I can buy higher speed ram.

I really appreciate for a full answer with complete explanation.

 

[Tradesman1]

Depends on the sticks, sounds like these OCed fairly easily and many will up a step (like here 2133 to 2400), from there if you go higher will prob require raising the timings, you'll reach a point that the higher timings, even with the high freq will end up performing worse than a lower freq with tighter timings. The manufacturers bin the chips and use the better chips to actually make the higher rated/freq DRAM sticks, thuus are guaranteed to run at higher freqs with good timings

 

[scuzzycard]

Your 2133 CL14 overclocked to 2400 CL14 will perform about the same as memory rated for 2400. I say "about" because secondary and tertiary timings (those settings you probably leave on "Auto") will turn out to be a little tighter for the 2400-spec RAM after the motherboard does its training. The 2400-spec RAM should also, of course, overclock higher than the 2133.

 

[Tradesman1]

The 2400-spec RAM should also, of course, overclock higher than the 2133.

__________________

The 2400 is tested and rated for 2400, so while it will default to the mobos 2133 spec, it's simply enable XMP and will run 2400 (as long at the CPUs MC can handle it), in this case the DRAM is rated 2400 so you aren't really OCng it, you are OCing the MC (memory controller) to run the DRAM to it's spec, the MC is rated to 2133. Then from there it will normally OC a step higher than it's rated 2400 at same or loosened timings, i.e. if 2400/13 should get 2666 either at 13 - 14. 2800 may be a different story

 

[radyab1297]

Thank you for your answers. I checked the CAS after overclocking and it is still at 14.
As far as I understood, if I have stable OC, the difference between rated ram and OC ram is almost the same until OC does not change latency too much.
So the only thing remains is this:
Should I use this ram in OC mode at 2400MHz or higher or change the ram to higher rated speed ram to get the maximum performance of my system in gaming?

 

[Tradesman1]

If stable - stay with what you have - the difference would be negligible - even in most BMs (benchmarks) - if thinking of jumping to new DRAM would look to 3200 or so to see more of a difference and 3000-3200 is sort of the sweet spot for price to performance